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Sony builds wireless data gang

TransferJet Consortium is go

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Sony has signed up some friends to support its short-range radio protocol, TransferJet, as members of the new TransferJet Consortium, but has stopped short of calling the proprietary protocol a standard.

The company has been demonstrating TransferJet for a few months now, pushing video between cameras and TVs as well as traditional computing devices. But until now those have always been Sony devices - a limitation the consortium is intended to address.

The usual suspects are lined up, with camera companies particularly well represented by Canon, Kodak, Nikon and Olympus. Samsung is also in there, but it joins consortia like other companies hire employees. Sony Ericsson has been strong-armed in, and KDDI also joins a list with a distinct Japanese flavour to it.

The consortium has a website, though it's not live at the time of writing, and promises to show some specifications real soon now. Even more importantly the consortium will be working to "establish licensing schemes and administer the use of the TransferJet logo".

TransferJet is a very fast, very short range, version of UWB - a standard already known for its high capacity and limited range. Quite why Sony feels it necessary to create its own version is a mystery, though the cynical might suggest that the licensing schemes are the most important factor here. ®